Living In Perhaps (32 page)

Stella came to visit me again. Mike was on duty this time. He
showed me into the same featureless room as before. The
window-blind was up. Outside I could see a small enclosed
garden, a bench-seat and a climbing rose. It was a pity we couldn't
sit out there. But summer rain was dripping off the leaves, making
them vibrate. A yellow rose petal dropped on to the wet paving
stones as I watched.

Stella and I sat with the coffee table between us. She had laid
out her cigarettes and lighter next to the ashtray, all ready.

'How is everyone?' I asked. I hadn't dared to say anything last
time. I'd been shocked to see Stella here at all, didn't want to
frighten her away with importunate questions.

She leaned forward, broke the cigarettes out of their
cellophane, and lit one quickly. 'You know Bettina's pregnant
again?'

I didn't. How would I? Everyone had been doing things while I
wasn't looking.

'Little Lisa's not a year old yet. She swears it was planned but I
don't think so. That girl never planned a thing in her life.'

I tried to sound casual. 'And what's Mandy up to these days?
Now she's a big sister?'

Stella exhaled smoke sideways and made a face. 'Don't ask.'

The silence stretched out. I could hear a blackbird outside,
singing as sweetly as if it wasn't raining.

'How are Ted and Edie?' I couldn't bring myself to call them
Mum and Dad. Stella looked stunned for a moment, then rallied.

'They've moved. Well, they couldn't stay in that house. They've
bought a flat in Colchester.' So, no more garden; no more straight
edges, or clicking of shears on summer nights. 'Your – she's gone
back to bookkeeping, and he's got a job with the Parks
Department.'

That should keep him happy, I thought. In a manner of speaking.
It would take his mind off his problems. Miles of municipal
edges to keep in shape. Perhaps they'd let him have a go with the
ride-on mower, too. Colchester would soon be famous for its
impeccably striped public lawns.

'And Brian?'

There was a tapping at the door. I looked round. I could see
Mike through the glass panel, holding two plastic cups on a tray.

'Good,' said Stella in a heartfelt voice. 'I could do with a drink.'

Mike helped us transfer the cups, along with two plastic spoons
and several sachets of sugar, to the table. 'No biscuits, I'm afraid,'
he said, 'I wasn't quick enough.' He looked from me to Stella but
I wouldn't meet his eye.

'What's he on about?' she asked, as soon as he was behind the
door again. I shrugged. I wasn't about to describe the domestic
arrangements to her. I wasn't going to give anything away, if I
could help it.

Stella lifted her cup and took a sip. 'Is this tea or coffee?'

I shrugged again. 'You were going to tell me about Brian.'

She put the cup down and said, 'Brian – Brian's got a social
worker. He has to go to some centre or other, couple of times a
week.'

That will go down well. A Supervision Order and a social
worker. No wonder they'd moved to Colchester.

Stella was glancing round again, appraising the decor. 'But it's
not bad here, is it, Carol? They let you have a bit of privacy. Give
you tea – or coffee! Not like prison visiting, is it? Not that I know
first-hand, but you see it on TV, don't you? Will they let you out,
you know, for little trips and that?'

'I don't know.'

Hanny would know. Hanny would know all the ins and outs of
the rehabilitation programme. Except that it was too late for me
to ask, and it didn't do her any good: knowing. You can have all
the information – jolly good information, too – but if you don't
use it, it's no help. If you don't know how to use it, or if you
don't choose to.

I think I let out a great big sigh, because Stella leaned forward
and squeezed my fingers with her large, warm hand. We weren't a
family that touched a lot, and I found myself feeling unutterably
grateful for that spontaneous human contact. No one ever
touched me any more. My eyes were hot and watery.

'It's all right, Carol,' Stella said. 'All right?' Though she had no
idea what she was talking about.

'I haven't told anyone I'm coming here,' she went on. 'It's none
of their business what I do or don't do.' She threw her head back
and gave a quick laugh. 'It never was. Not that they thought that
way.'

'You always were the subject of gossip,' I told her.

'The
subject
of
gossip
.' She seemed to relish that phrase, and lit
a fresh cigarette in a leisurely way, and sat there smiling for
another moment or two.

'And now it's me, instead,' I said. That wiped the smile away.

'No, they don't talk about you. They don't mention you at all.'

'Not even Gloria?'

Stella shook her head. Today she was wearing white linen
slacks, and she brushed a speck of cigarette ash off her spotless
knee.

'Do you still work at the fish-and-chip shop?' I asked.

She grinned. 'No, course not. Haven't for months. I'm a
housewife
now, aren't I? I should think it'd be bloody boring if you
hadn't slaved your guts out behind a counter for most of your life,
but I
like
it. Bit of washing-up, bit of dusting. Lord and master's
tea on the table in time for when he comes home. It's a piece of
cake.'

'What, the lord and master's tea?'

Stella giggled. She tapped the back of my knuckles with one
peach-painted nail. 'You're doing all right, Carol. You'll be all
right, you will.'

I should have wept and fallen on her neck, but we didn't do that
kind of thing. Not in our family.

She gave me an earnest look. 'You've just got to get yourself
sorted out, Carol. They'll get you sorted out, and then we'll
see ...'

This was all too much, too close to the bone. I gave the garden
a fierce examination, and Stella busied herself by rummaging in
her bag.

'I got you a book, like you asked,' she said. 'You said you wanted
a thick one. I hope it's all right. You know I'm not a great
book-lover.'

She pushed a big book over the table at me. It was almost as
thick as it was wide.

'First I thought of bringing the Bible, but then I thought you'd
probably read most of that, in that Sunday school she sent you to.
So I got this instead.'

I could read the title upside down.

Stella shot me a hopeful smile. 'Like they say on
Desert Island
Discs
: the Bible, and Shakespeare.'

My eyes felt hot again. If you had to choose a fairy godmother,
Stella in this latest manifestation would certainly do.

Mike was rapping gently on the door. He poked his head inside
and said, 'Time's almost up, ladies.' Like a cheerful barman.

'I'll come again, after Spain,' Stella said. 'Promise.'

I felt bruised. I'm not used to anyone being nice. As Mike
escorted me back to the lounge I looked at my fingers where Stella
had touched me and felt them burning, like a saint's stigmata.

*

Once I attempted a peace treaty with Brian. We were both over
sixteen, we were both adopted – there had to be some common
ground. Act like grown-ups, start again.

So, up the steep red-carpeted stairs. Brian was working at his
desk, leaning over a notepad. Whatever he was writing or drawing,
he covered it up with his arm as I stepped into the room. He
expected me to say, 'Your tea's on the table,' or, 'Mum wants you.'
The windows were open. I inhaled deeply, drew the summer
evening air into my lungs: top notes of freshly mown lawns and
night-scented stocks, cut with a dash of petrol from the main
road. Stay-at-homes and getaways. Nostalgia for that week, that
single week of nights spent up here, washed through me. I shut
my eyes and rocked gently on the balls of my feet.

'What d'you want?' Brian asked grumpily, because I hadn't
spoken.

I said, 'Do you remember, in junior school, that first time I ever
bunked off and you helped me by taking a note to my teacher? A
forged note?'

I recalled that feeling that I had back then, the joy of bending
him to my will.

He gave me a mean look, as if to ask why I was bringing that
up. His eyebrows had thickened to ridiculous levels, wayward
hedges themselves now, above the rims of his glasses.

'You do, don't you?'

He took off his glasses and rubbed the lenses with a corner of
his handkerchief.

'Ye-es.'

A monosyllable that conveyed 'Maybe I do,' and 'What's it
worth?' and 'Where's all this leading to?' I know I've said he's not
an expressive sort of boy, but sometimes he can pull the rabbit out
of the hat. Or at least coax it to peep over the edge.

'You remember the International Spy Kit that Uncle Bob
gave you?'

Now he couldn't help it: his mouth creaked into a semi-grin.

'The keys were crap,' he said.

'The plastic skeleton keys! I wonder what happened to them?'

But he turned his back to me and bent over the notepad again,
crooking his arm around his pen. He clearly wasn't one for
nostalgia.

'And that kid with the trike?' I tried. 'We put rocks in the back,
remember?'

Nothing, not even a grunt, this time.

'See, we used to have fun together,' I insisted. 'Way back when.
Think how much we both hated Mandy. Those plans we always
made to steal her sweets.'

'Carol?' His voice was head-down, blurry.

'What?'

'I'm busy. Get out of my room.'

I took one step backwards. 'I'm just saying that we did.'

He looked up again, his eyes heavy-lidded with boredom. 'I
know how to have fun,' he said. 'Just not
your
way.' And then his
head went down again, over his secret work.

I was going to leave, I was halfway out the door, but I stopped.
'I know about your fun,' I said. 'I know about you.'

Nothing moved – not a finger, not a hair – but I was sure he'd
heard me. People go still like that when they're listening, when
they're really listening.

Tom didn't come back at all that Easter. Tom Rose did. Tom Rose
was a good boy, a loving son, and came home to see his mother.
He dropped into the dry cleaner's one afternoon and asked if I
would come for a drink. 'OK,' I said, with the brilliant sparkling
enthusiasm of one who has nothing else to do.

In the pub that evening Tom Rose said, 'What d'you think of
Tom's place, then?'

Tom Rose was big, broad, most convincing. His hands around
the pint glass looked as if they could mend a car or chop down a
tree. He sat with his legs apart in that male fashion, as if their
testicles are just too amazingly enormous to be housed comfortably
in the space of an ordinary chair. The seams of his trousers
strained around his thigh muscles. It was just like being out with
a real grown-up.

'Tom's place?'

'His flat? What did you think of it?'

What could I think? A place only visited in my imagination. At
an address I hadn't been vouchsafed.

'When were you there?'

'In February. Just for the weekend.'

'Oh, yes.' I nodded, as if I'd known all about it. 'Not bad.'

'It's such a
tip
. A dump. I don't know why he didn't stay in hall,
or lodge with his well-off friends. I would.'

'Well, so would I. But you know Tom.'

We paused, considering our knowledge of Tom. I moved my
glass – martini and lemonade – in circles on the wet table top. I'd
never really got a taste for alcoholic drinks and tended to choose
something sweet and innocuous.

'You know, when we used to play Monopoly,' I was moved to
ask, 'did you sometimes cheat? About buying the stations, I mean.
And the electric light company.'

Tom Rose laughed, his old snickering laugh, though deeper
now.

'Oh, always.'

'No wonder I couldn't win.'

'No wonder.'

I didn't like the way he laughed. It was always as if he knew
something that other people didn't.

I slept with Tom Rose, all through those Easter holidays, when
his mum was at work at the dairy products factory out near
Bossey Down. His bedroom curtains were thin and the daylight
came in. He had some characteristics that my Tom never had,
making me feel, during those very minutes, those slow, short
minutes when nothing much else existed, that this was what it was
all about. The future, and fun, and love. In some ways I hated to
do it, but it was all information, and some of it was good
information.

I lay back on his pillow and Tom Rose stroked my hair. It was
getting quite long; I hadn't let Bettina's scissors anywhere near it
in the last two years, except to trim the split ends. Tom Rose's
hand felt tender at first and then, because it kept going over and
over the same place, irritating. I twitched out from under it.

'What are we doing, Caro?' he said. 'I mean, for fuck's sake, Tom
and everything?'

So I told him. I thought he'd understand. I said it lightly. 'We
are the Hennessys' toys, and when they stop playing, we're left
alone in the toybox.'

'Where d'you get that from?'

'I worked it out.' And I was reading
Tess of the D'Urbervilles
.

Tom Rose leaned up on one elbow and propped his head on his
hand. There was a stripe of sunshine across his chest. 'You know,
sometimes you're really quite clever, Caroline Clipper.' He rolled
over and got up, pulling his jeans on quickly with his back turned.
'But it's all bollocks, what you said.'

He'd taken to wearing fluffy checked lumberjack shirts, and he
picked one off the floor, sniffed it and tugged it on, still buttoned,
over his round rugby player's head.

'You ought to do something with your life, Caro. Get another
job, or save up some money and just get out of here.'

He kicked a balled sock across the carpet, and sat down
grumpily to pull his loafers on over bare feet.